Debbie Sheddan on target for Games qualifying time

Press, 20 November 1989, Page 28

Debbie Sheddan on target for Games qualifying time

Debbie Sheddan (Olympic) showed that she was well on target in her search for Commonwealth Games selection by returning another personal best performance when the A.N.Z. Bank athletic club championships were concluded at Queen Elizabeth II Park on Saturday. Sheddan has run a personal best time in each of her five starts this season. Running in the boys under 16/800 metres on Saturday for better competition, she cut another 2sec. from her previous best time in running the distance in 2min lOsec. So far this season she has sliced 4 sec. from her 800metre time.

Sheddan will make her main bid for the Games in the 1500 m when the national senior championships and Games trials are held at Auckland on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. She is also entered for the 3000 metres. Sheddan was thrilled with her performance on Saturday, with her time indicating she has plenty

of pace, as well as stamina, for the 1500 metres. She has the best time in New Zealand this season for the distance, fractionally outside the Games qualifying standard with her 4min 16.6 sec.

The preliminary selections of athletes for the games are expected to be announced after the end

of the trials on Sunday, with provision for other selections to be made up to December 31 for events in which a full complement has not already been named. Mary O’Connor (University) won a closely contested senior women’s 1500 metres, after doing much of the pacemaking. Rowyn Hocking (Christ-church-Avon) and Michelle Dravitski (Nelson) surged through to a useful last lap break only to see O’Connor surge back to win by several metres in 4 min. 37.23 sec.

Debbie Nelson (New Brighton) topped that effort, however, by returning 4 min. 29.10 sec. by running in the senior men’s B grade contest to clip nearly 2 sec. off the 4 min. 31 sec. she recorded at Nelson recently. Kay Nordstrom Papa-nui-Toc H) was in good form, with her winning throw of 55.46 metres in the senior women’s javelin being less than 2 metres short of her last season’s national

record. Steven Rollings (Ashburton) was in fine fettle to clear 2.07 metres in the senior men’s high jump and only narrowly failing at 2.14 metres. Peter Renner (New Brighton) had a good pace work-out in his preparation for the national 3000 metre steeplechase to win the senior men’s 1500 metres in 3min. 47.65 sec., narrowly beating his teammate, Rob Mulcahy. Jayne Moffitt (Old Boys-United) edged past the games qualifying standard in her specialty event by leaping 6.41 metres in the senior women’s long jump. She completed a useful double by winning the 100 metres in 12.08 sec, heading Kirsten Downie (Technical) and Leanne StapyltonSmith (Old Boys-United). Chris Mene (PapanuiToc H) was one of the under-age athletes to break a record. For the third time this season he improved on his Canterbury under-18 discus throw record, lifting his

distance from his last season’s record of 52.24 metres to that of 55.06 metres on Saturday.

Mene is steadily closing the gap to the national record of 58.30 metres set by Courtenay Ireland (Waikato) early last season.

Rowena Welford (South Canterbury) was another youngster to shine with a dashing performance in the girls’ under-16 80 metres hurdles. A new event introduced last season, a record that has not been recognised for the distance yet, but she held the Canterbury best performance of 12 sec. She shattered that on Saturday with'a dash of 11.4 sec., which is likely to be accepted as good enough to be a record.

Janice Maxwell (Technical) retained superiority in the senior women’s shot put with 14.60 metres. Liz Ryan (Papa-nui-Toc H) with 13.59 metres, narrowly took second place from Tania Lutton (Technical).